Washington Brief

The White House Office of Management and Budget said it received the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed changes to the Clean Power Plan, the last step before the EPA can release the proposal publicly. (The Hill)

President Donald Trump said he will set up a council to penalize any federal agency that is “consistently delaying” infrastructure projects. (Washington Examiner)

French President Emmanuel Macron launched a website that encourages scientists and researchers to move to France to research climate change. (NBC News)

Business Brief

Exxon Mobil Corp. asked a New York court to reject a subpoena request from Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, saying his claim to have found evidence Exxon misled investors was “frivolous.” (Reuters)

Toshiba Corp. will pay $3.7 billion for two nuclear reactors under construction in Georgia by its U.S. subsidiary Westinghouse, which has filed for bankruptcy protection. (The Associated Press)

General

President Trump’s White House is reviewing the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed reconsideration of former President Barack Obama’s climate change rule for power plants. The White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) said early Friday that it received the proposed “review” of the rule Thursday from the EPA.

President Trump’s plan to invest $1 trillion in infrastructure would include stiff penalties for any federal agency found to be stalling new road, bridge or dam approvals. Trump said the administration would set up a new “council” to help project managers navigate the “bureaucratic maze,” but its other function would be to “make sure that every federal agency that is consistently delaying projects by missing deadlines will face tough, new penalties.”

Oil rose on Monday to break a three-day losing streak, after futures traders increased their bets on a renewed price upswing even though physical markets remain bloated, especially from a relentless rise in U.S. drilling. Brent crude futures had risen 23 cents to $48.38 per barrel by 0900 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures gained 17 cents to $46.00 per barrel.

Oil and Natural Gas

Exxon Mobil Corp asked a New York court on Friday to reject another subpoena request from Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, arguing the prosecutor’s recent claim to have found evidence Exxon misled investors was false and that he was abusing his investigative powers. The company said Schneiderman’s allegation it had neglected to estimate the impact of future environmental regulation on new deals was “frivolous” and that no “legitimate law enforcement need” would be served by giving his office more documents.

Qatar’s energy minister said Sunday the country remains committed to limiting its oil output through March 2018 under an agreement with other big oil producers, despite the severing of its diplomatic relations with OPEC allies Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. “Circumstances in the region shall not prevent the state of Qatar from honoring its international commitment of cutting its oil production,” Mohammed al-Sada said in an emailed statement.

Looking for an excuse to pack up the car for a road trip this weekend Look no further: The average nationwide gasoline price on Friday was the lowest for this point of the year since 2005, according to GasBuddy, a website and smartphone app designed to help drivers find the best deals at the pump.

The United States shipping of Liquefied Natural Gas overseas is an act to confront economic aggression and to decrease Russia’s leverage as Europe’s dominant gas supplier, said Energy Secretary Rick Perry. The U.S. on Friday delivered the first-ever shipments of its natural gas to northern Europe – Netherlands and Poland.

Utilities and Infrastructure

State officials plan to install air quality monitoring equipment by this fall near a Pasadena power plant, after conflicting reports from federal and state officials left residents with uncertainty about the quality of the air they are breathing. In July 2016, the Environmental Protection Agency ruled that areas within a 17-mile radius of the coal-burning Herbert A. Wagner Generating Station are exposed to unhealthy levels of sulfur dioxide, a pollutant that officials said contributes to respiratory problems, particularly in the young, elderly, and people with asthma problems.

Renewables

Massachusetts’ bid to become the nation’s leader in offshore wind power is ramping up. The state’s electric utilities — National Grid, Eversource and Unitil — are slated to release by June 30 their requirements for projects seeking to develop the state’s first ocean-based wind farm.

Solar and wind farm costs could rise under the Finkel blueprint for National Energy Market security, with a move to offset reduced reliability from state renewable energy targets potentially making solar power more expensive than gas in some circumstances. One of the 50 recommendations in Chief Scientist Alan Finkel’s review of the NEM, is that a “generator reliability obligation” be developed that would force new wind and solar projects in regions that already have highly variable power sources to provide access to on-call power sources, such as battery, or gas-fired, power.

Coal

Glencore has gatecrashed a planned Chinese takeover of Rio Tinto’s Australian coal business, tabling a $2.55bn counter-offer that pitches Ivan Glasenberg, its dealmaking chief executive, into a new bid battle. The move shows the Swiss-based miner and commodity trader, which was almost brought to its knees just two years ago by the commodity downturn, has lost none of its appetite for acquisitions after paying down debt and deleveraging its balance sheet.

The coal industry’s future may have much more to do with building smartphones, wind turbines and missile defense radar than billowing smoke stacks and environmental finger pointing, say federal coal advisers and experts. The direction of the industry is aimed at harvesting what are known as “rare earth elements,” for which the U.S. industry depends on China.

Nuclear

Money-losing Japanese nuclear and electronics company Toshiba Corp. will pay $3.68 billion toward the construction of two reactors in Georgia by its U.S. unit Westinghouse, which has filed for bankruptcy protection. Tokyo-based Toshiba said Saturday the payment, under agreement with the operator of the Vogtle plant, will be made from October through January 2021.

One of two nuclear power plants at Indian Point in Westchester County is being shut down to replace leaky water seals. Entergy Corporation says the Unit 3 power plant 30 miles north of New York City will be shut down Sunday night to replace two water seals between the lid of the reactor and the reactor vessel.

The Clinton Power Station is fully operational a little more than a year after plant owner Exelon Corp. warned the nuclear reactor would shut down this month if financial losses continued. In between, state lawmakers approved and Gov. Bruce Rauner signed legislation providing $235 million in ratepayer subsidies annually to Exelon to keep the Clinton reactor and a nuclear power station in the Quad Cities running for at least another decade.

Beneath a forested patch of land on the Gulf of Bothnia, at the bottom of a steep tunnel that winds for three miles through granite bedrock, Finland is getting ready to entomb its nuclear waste. If all goes well, sometime early in the next decade the first of what will be nearly 3,000 sealed copper canisters, each up to 17 feet long and containing about two tons of spent reactor fuel from Finland’s nuclear power industry, will be lowered into a vertical borehole in a side tunnel about 1,400 feet underground.

Climate

French President Emmanuel Macron is hitting back at President Donald Trump over the U.S. decision to withdraw from the Paris climate change accord with a new website that encourages scientists and researchers to move to France. The website, Make Our Planet Great Again, parodies Trump’s campaign slogan and calls on “all responsible citizens” to take their fight against climate change to France.

Puerto Rico, a dozen states and hundreds of municipalities have stepped up to fight climate change in response to President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. Through formal and informal initiatives, the non-federal government bodies are seeking to work directly with foreign governments to reduce emissions.

Opinions, Editorials and Perspectives

In May, the U.S. Energy Information Agency released a daily energy brief summarizing the current and future state of nuclear energy production in America. According to the EIA, nuclear’s share of the nation’s electricity generating capacity will drop from 20 percent to 11 percent by 2050.

Donald Trump justified his decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement by claiming that compliance would impose crippling economic burdens on the United States. “I happen to love the coal miners,” Trump declared, before reaffirming his intention to make the fossil fuel the centerpiece of the nation’s energy policy.

When Energy Secretary Rick Perry ordered a 60-day review of the “long-term reliability of the electric grid” on April 15, he might as well have cited California’s energy policies as the target of his inquiry. California, after all, is the nation’s leading supporter of renewable energy, which fossil fuel advocates maintain is destabilizing the grid.

Research Reports

Agriculture and forestry are important economic sectors that are vulnerable to changes in the climate system. Climate change both positively and negatively affects the distribution and productivity of these sectors, as production is sensitive to changes in temperature and precipitation, carbon dioxide fertilization effects, availability of water for irrigation, increasingly frequent and severe extreme weather, and stress from diseases and pests.